Classic Roguelike fans - what's your poison?

Are you more into the classic Hacklikes or Nethack itself? Or some weird and wacky -Band variant as about 70% of the genre seems to consist of?

Maybe you're into more modernised ones with hires animated sprites like Sots: The Pit?

Or the quirkiness of Dungeons of Dredmor.

Or perhaps, the tried and true, slightly less random experience of ToME?

Survival roguelikes such as Cataclysm perhaps, or Zomboid (which seems close enough for me)?

Or bright and colourful titles pushing the boundaries of text art like Caves of Qud?

Or do you blast your way through hell in the caverns of DoomRL?

As you may have guessed, I've a fair enthusiasm for the genre, certainly more than I seem to have for the more modern realtime Roguelites. I don't think they're bad, enjoyed a fair few, but I've ever enjoyed turn or TU based than realtime.

So, for a bit of direction to the question, maybe tell us about your personal top pick and, perhaps, any interesting ones you've picked up on recently.

For me, it's probably ToME or at least it's my default these days. Comfy user interface, many ways to build, and it doesn't feel quite as frustrating somehow when I lose my 20 hour character to a single dumb mistake.

In terms of recent discoveries, picked up Moonring today and been enjoying the slightly eye-searing experience so far. Doesn't seem to be one of those where going for all kills is necessarily a benefit - power is gained through serving the gods, who may or may not be the big bads... honestly it's closer to RPG than Roguelike, by it's own admission a bit of Ultima is in there, and it has an unusually heavy emphasis on conversation therefore, but it's close enough to count I say.

I think I've mentioned this before but the original Rogue is available on Steam (not the original original, obviously, but the DOS port). It makes a surprisingly good pick-up-and-play game when you're not waiting 10 minutes for it to load.

I used to play abominable amounts of NetHack. Still play it once in a while.

My recent goto is Infra Arcana. Outside of, say, Cataclysm, Cogmind (maybe X@COM as well), or DRL, a couple others, its gun combat is amongst the best you'll find in a roguelike. Then on top of that you have a Call of Cthulhu style sanity system in play and you get a game where combat is so consistently discouraged (you're quickly driven insane if you fight the game's monstrosities head on, and you gain no experience for killing them) you're constantly doing a balancing act between getting the resources you need from the level and getting to the next level safely before you go mad.

Also, there are Blood-style cultists and they're just as dangerous as they were in that game.

There is a curator I like to follow on Steam that tracks Actual Roguelikes that you can get on Steam.

dcss and qud are as good as they get imo

i recently played a little bit of one of the fushigi no dungeon games (shiren the wanderer on vita) for the first time and was honestly surprised to find that it's more of a game like Rogue (1980) than at least 95% of the software claiming to be a game like Rogue (1980) in the current day. sure it doesn't control like the text editor vi, and it has very fancy and comprehensive tileset but it's legit as far as i'm concerned. very good to play on the go.

ToME i tried a bunch and was put off by the way that the equipment names are too long and irritating to compare. dunno, I'm not into "builds" in these sorts of games... I wanna pick prof and fantasy race and then go whip small kobolds and farm speed potions for a hundred hours and then die to 600 pts of acid breath

edit: mmm I recommend this differently-perspectived quickplay roguelike >:3

DCSS is almost certainly my second-most played game after Doom, I'm sure I have at least 4000 hours in it. (I played online for a while but I don't wanna log in and check, plus I have lots of time offline.) I don't think I'm ever going back to it though, spent too much time in it already and have no desire to play it again, tried once or twice over the past few years but all interest is gone. It's not sad though, just time to do other things.

Played a lot of Jupiter Hell, the spiritual sequel to DoomRL. I could never get into DoomRL (too close to Doom but also too different?) but I liked JH a lot. Also played a lot of POWDER and some other things. I haven't played any "true" roguelikes in a while though.

Cataclysim DDA was OK for a bit but it basically felt like "Grinding: The Game"

Was never able to get into Nethack, tried for a while when I was first discovering the genre and then thought "well maybe roguelikes aren't for me" before giving POWDER a shot and discovering that it was just Nethack I didn't like.

52 minutes ago, plums said:

Was never able to get into Nethack, tried for a while when I was first discovering the genre and then thought "well maybe roguelikes aren't for me" before giving POWDER a shot and discovering that it was just Nethack I didn't like.

Yea Roguelikes are kinda like ice cream flavours I'd say, and Nethack's kinda the Raisin Rum to DCSS' Blueberry.
I've tried off and on DCSS over the years, enjoy it in short bursts but doesn't seem to quite click for me.

Jupiter Hell I picked up early on but only got into for a brief period... from what I can tell it's expanded massively since then so maybe I'll give it a fresh install.

POWDER... never tried. Weirdly.

@yakfak I've played far too much Dwarf Fortress not to know how digging deep ends XD. 
@LexiMax Seems like a fairly comprehensive list, reminded me I still need to give Rift Wizard a try at some point
@Wahrnehmungskrieg I've tried some IA and it's definitely one of the cooler atmospheric Roguelikes I've played, I suggest Moonring as similarly inclined towards exploration and avoiding combat without cause.
@Bucket sometimes the simple, classic formula is best for one's mood. As many a Doom player might agree with heh. 

Just now, Zerofuchs said:

Jupiter Hell I picked up early on but only got into for a brief period... from what I can tell it's expanded massively since then so maybe I'll give it a fresh install.

I haven't actually played JH in a few years now either so I'm sure it's massively different now. I'm sure I'll give it another shot sometime.

Procedural generation getting grafted onto everything has made me hate the term, but I still love roguelikes themselves, even if the stuff that first introduced me to the genre is what I've ultimately spent the most time on: Ancient Domains Of Mystery and the SNES original Shiren.

Whilst I'd played a few CRPG's before, ADOM was still something of an epiphany back when I discovered it. Something about it having some kind of initial structure that could then be subverted to create whatever emergent narrative made it click for me a lot better than other roguelikes that just threw you down a hole and told you to get on with it. That's also enjoyable, but being able to roll up to the first town and take a bunch of quests or murder the sheriff and make off with people's loot went a long way in making it feel like a real actual world that you could either save or crush under your heel.

Shiren's big draw was obviously the aesthetics, but the more I got to know the game, the more I liked how limited self-contained it felt. To put it into perspective, a good number of roguelikes have  what feel like a near-infinite amount of possible items and weapons and monster types, and that "kitchen sink" feel where you might pick up some kind of rare scroll of Real Ultimate Power or get unexpectedly slapped by a demonic owlbear on level two of a dungeon is a big part of what makes the genre tick. But Shiren feels more like you don't have to play for too long before you've seen everything that it has to offer. Obviously you're going to have less stuff if you have to produce a sprite for it rather than simply ascribing an ASCII character and colour to it. And yet rather than that being a negative, it feels like the game lays everything out on the table, and then it's up to you to manipulate all the mechanics in order to produce a good run.

It even gives you a helping hand in that respect by allowing you to stash powerful items away with the storehouse system - if you're about to be overwhelmed, but you've got yourself a Polearm of Goblin-Buggering +4 and a magical ceramic pot, send the spear back to town and start a fresh run with it. So you can try and play it traditionally, or you can spend an eternity piecing together the best possible gear... and still get rolled up by a monster house in the fourth area (I love that the monster closets are always called "monster houses" in the Mystery Dungeon series, btw). The storehouses are the "push your luck" mechanic that the genre thrives on, just given a little twist.

In sum, the game is nakedly about manipulating mechanics, but it's a terrifically solid example of the genre, held together cohesively by a charming little fantasy medieval Japan aesthetic sporting a quintessentially "we're going on an adventure" 16bit JRPG OST.

I've never spent much time with other games in the series, but have to give props to its fourth mainline outing on the DS, for ditching Japan and just going absolutely whackadoo - washing Shiren up on a tropical island, making him captive of the jaguar king, and having him team up with a hang-gliding, six-shooter-toting cowgirl, a pirate king and a trio of monkey siblings. I remember it frontloading a depressingly silly number of mechanics and story instead of just letting you set out, but it was such a change of pace for the series and so achingly daft that it was impossible to dislike.

And while I've never delved into the later PSX/PS2 editions, it would be remiss of me to not mention Torneko's Great Adventure for actually kicking off the Fushigi no Dungeon/Mystery Dungeon series. It's never held my attention long term the way Shiren has, but that endearing Dragon Quest coat of paint makes it one of the easiest recommendations for an introduction to the genre. You're just the doofy, fat shopkeeper from DQ trying to CAPITALISM, HO! to feed his family, but you've got to venture into the dungeon to actually stock your store. Whole lot of heart in that one, thanks to Toriyama's inimitable designs.

Wasn't expecting to post a novel-length hagiography - guess I'll get into the ultimate kitchen sink, Elona, later...

On 6/9/2024 at 6:59 PM, Zerofuchs said:

Or the quirkiness of Dungeons of Dredmor.

Ah, yay! Someone else knows about Dungeons of Dredmor??

I played it at a PAX Prime in Seattle so many years ago, when the devs had it on display in the indie section, and bought it as soon as I got home from that convention (or as soon as it released after that, can't remember the exact timeframe back then).

Good stuff, I always enjoy coming back to it. So much *fun* in that game, and that's why I play games. =)

16 minutes ago, DiavoJinx said:

Ah! Someone else knows about Dungeons of Dredmor??

 

I played it at a PAX Prime in Seattle so many years ago, when the devs had it on display in the indie section, and bought it as soon as I got home from that convention (or as soon as it released after that, can't remember the exact timeframe back then).

Good stuff, I always enjoy coming back to it. So much *fun* in that game, and that's why I play games. =)

If you haven't given it a try yet, maybe give Dungeonmans a look. Also a very tongue in cheek kind of Roguelike:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/288120/Dungeonmans/

33 minutes ago, DiavoJinx said:

Ah, yay! Someone else knows about Dungeons of Dredmor??

 

I played it at a PAX Prime in Seattle so many years ago, when the devs had it on display in the indie section, and bought it as soon as I got home from that convention (or as soon as it released after that, can't remember the exact timeframe back then).

Good stuff, I always enjoy coming back to it. So much *fun* in that game, and that's why I play games. =)

I put 95 hours into Dungeons of Dredmor, and had a great time...and then Isaac came around...and then that just took over my life.

As for 'classic roguelikes' - I don't know what your definition is...but I'm guessing turn-based? Although, Zomboid isn't, so...err I have no idea what you're classing as a 'classic roguelike'.

I assume Dungeon Rogue / Reaping the Dungeon fits your definition. I love that game so much. It's free...but you also have to email the dev to get the file:
http://www.heuse.com/

16 minutes ago, BeachThunder said:

I put 95 hours into Dungeons of Dredmor, and had a great time...and then Isaac came around...and then that just took over my life.

 

As for 'classic roguelikes' - I don't know what your definition is...but I'm guessing turn-based? Although, Zomboid isn't, so...err I have no idea what you're classing as a 'classic roguelike'.

 

I assume Dungeon Rogue / Reaping the Dungeon fits your definition. I love that game so much. It's free...but you also have to email the dev to get the file:
http://www.heuse.com/

Looks like it from a first glance.

There are some "official" definitions for what constitutes a Roguelike out there, mostly to keep things within reason for 7DRL challenges and categorisation. Adoption varies.

As for me I'm not all that rigid about it, but to me the archetypical roguelike is turn based, top down, with a single character, and generally involves diving into a dungeon (or similar kind of locale). But I'm not going to stress or lecture if people start posting games that don't quite click lol, it's all in good fun.

Likewise, I wasn't surprised the OP mentions Project Zomboid.  I treat it like a rogue-like, myself (I'm not good at it, always feel like I don't know what I'm doing... /shrug).

Binding of Issac is fantastic, for an "action" (not turn-based) modern rogue-alike.

On 6/11/2024 at 2:14 AM, heliumlamb said:

a game like Rogue (1980) than at least 95% of the software claiming to be a game like Rogue (1980) in the current day.

Yeah, this is an issue... but to be fair, the terms Rogue-like and Rogue-LITE are way too similar in both speech and text, and I think people literally confuse them just based on that alone. I mean, one of my gamer friends asked me if there's a difference, as she wasn't even sure that they were separate terms.

I'm a bit of a purist and I think some of those games just meant to say lite instead of like. A "true" roguelike should have the key elements of Rogue - and the most important one in my eyes is Permadeath. Hopefully it will also include real character building and open ended combat where you can do things like throw random items at monsters (was that in the original though?) But at the end of the day, permadeath (and of course, real threats to go with it) is what changes the entire experience. It forces your decision making into a different plane of existence, one where you might actually run away from the treasure for fear of losing your character. One where you might engage in a long battle, throwing everything you have, until at the last moment you realize it is fruitless and start desperately trying to escape. Where you can go limping back to town with 1hp, literally trying to avoid getting stung by a bee or else that's it for your high level character.

If it doesn't have any of that, it's LITE 

Ah! I just looked at the directory of Dungeons of Dredmor and there's a /tunes/ folder with all the music right there in .ogg format.
I LOVE have a good game's good music to add to my... checks Winamp Library view... 14,682 mp3s (79.21Gb)!

On 6/10/2024 at 9:26 AM, Bucket said:

I think I've mentioned this before but the original Rogue is available on Steam (not the original original, obviously, but the DOS port). It makes a surprisingly good pick-up-and-play game when you're not waiting 10 minutes for it to load.

The original Rogue is surprisingly hard to come by. All of the Linux ports are either plain old clones, or fail to compile. It's still available if you use simh (vax780 architecture) with one of those BSD 4.3 images getting around however. Getting that one to work is pretty complicated, but there's tutorials available. It really is a complete wonder nobody maintains it, it's open-source and everything.

Here's how it looks in Unifont

EDIT

As for me, my favourite roguelikes are Fallout and Fallout 2